The Press FRIDAY, JULY 11, 1941. General Dentz Seeks An Armistice

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23378, 11 July 1941, Page 6

The Press FRIDAY, JULY 11, 1941. General Dentz Seeks An Armistice

The news that the fighting in Syria has been ended by an armistice will be welcomed throughout the British Commonwealth and, it is possible to believe, throughout France and her colonies. However necessary the campaign may have been, it is. as Mr Churchill says, a tragedy that 1500 British soldiers should have

been killed or wounded by French bullets in operations the sole purpose of which is to rid Europe of National Socialism. Moreover, a

consideration of more immediate importance is

that every week of hostilities in Syria increased the possibility of a general embroilment between Great Britain and Vichy-con-trolled France, a development which Berlin has been hoping for and openly predicting. Indeed, it seems probable that when Germany’s plans for a large-scale offensive in Asia Minor miscarried because of the premature outbreak of the revolt in Iraq, she resorted, as a second-best course, to a deliberate attempt to make Syria a cause of war between Great Britain and France. If this view is correct, then the reports of German troop landings in Syria were almost certainly of German origin; and it is significant that British communiques have not reported the presence of German troops in Syria or evidences of any extensive German occupation. This, of course, does not show that the decision to attack Syria was unjustified or was based on inaccurate information. The relevant and undenied facts are that German and Italian agents in Syria helped to engineer the Iraq revolt, that French arms were sent to the Iraqi rebels, and that German military aeroplanes assisting the Iraqi rebels used Syrian aerodromes. The dislodging of Axis propaganda centres and air bases in Syria was essential to the security of Cyprus, Iraq, and Palestine and to the inaintenance.of British influence throughout the Arab world. If the British Middle Eastern Command erred in its assessment of the Syrian situation it was not in its estimate of the extent of Axis infiltration but in its estimate of the probable strength of the opposition which the invaders would encounter. The expectation of widespread Arab opposition to the French defenders was proved unfounded; and it seems that, even if Axis propaganda has not won over the Arabs, it has left them on the whole confused and apathetic. The expectation that General Dentz’s armies would be seriously weakened by poor morale also turned out to be unjustified, mainly because most of the severe fighting was done by the gallant mercenaries of the Foreign Legion, who do not concern themselves with the political side of war. In the event, General Dentz showed himself a bold and cool tactician, some of his counter-attacks coming within an ace of inflicting serious reverses on the invaders. It is now dear that the forces originally detached for the Syrian campaign were too small for their task; and it was only after the arrival of substantial reinforcements" that Palmyra was the ultimate success of the campaign • ’.pie cessation of hostilities will enable the Middle Eastern Command to use. the whole of its forces in a new offensive in the Western Desert with the double object of easing the pressure on Russia and finally ending the threat to Egypt, A remarkable and encouraging feature of the Syrian affair is that the Vichy Government, since its formal condemnation of the invasion as an act of -unprovoked aggression, has viewed the campaign with detached impartiality. Its announcement of' the fall of Palmyra even stressed the difficulties created fqy the defenders. Vichy, it is clear, has defended Syria as a matter of unwelcome obligation ; and has done its best to keep the affair from the. wider question of relations between Great Britain and the United States bn the one hand and France and her African colonies on the other. The reasons which have induced the United States to reopen normal trade with French North Africa Ore thus made a little clearer.